Never Alone
by artemis-nz
Summary: When Usagi is away, Misaki finds himself in an inescapable situation despite his best efforts. Usagi deals with it. Usami/Misaki.


**A first attempt at a Junjou Romantica fic – please be gentle.**

**

* * *

  
**

He wasn't used to being alone.

The apartment was too big, the rooms too spacious, the windows too high up, the city lights too far away. Everything spoke of being by himself; the dishes, all stacked neatly in their proper places, the benches and floors virtually sparkling. The complete and utter lack of mess.

All his life, Misaki had been in close physical proximity to somebody else. His parents had never been stinting with their affection. Neither had his brother, who, always very caring to begin with, had lavished love on Misaki after… well, after. And he had left school, so that Misaki himself could be supported both physically and emotionally. He did not want for anything, because Takahiro was determined that his younger brother should not.

And as a result, Misaki grew completely used to always having somebody there. Always, the presence of an older, more experienced, warm male; a constant thing, to fill the void that he dared not admit to out loud, lest that presence suddenly no longer be enough.

And then came Usagi.

_Then came Usagi._

Affectionate again, albeit in quite an altogether different sense of the word. The void began to close in on itself, until there was only a small sliver of blackness left, only recognisable every now and again, like when he saw parents hugging their children on the street, or holding hands when crossing the road. And even those things he could deal with, because there was still a constant. He wasn't left by himself, to consider the little emptiness left over.

Until Usagi was gone, and the little emptiness became a larger emptiness, only emphasised by the other, visible emptiness of the apartment.

Because the truth was, he had seen Usagi off on his business trip with a smile, not even overly forced. He cleaned the apartment from top to bottom with a vengeance, since the opportunity to do so without being interrupted by big bear-hands wrapping around him without the least bit of warning, hands creeping up his shirt with scarce a moment's notice, was too good to pass up.

Only when he had finished with his room, and the bathroom, the lounge, and the bathroom, there was Usagi's room left. Of all the room's, it needed the most attention.

He had opened the door, gazed around at the truly spectacular amount of clutter, and closed it again. It smelled of Usagi.

Two days later, and that door had remained closed. He hadn't slept well that first night, or the next. There was still another two days to go. Misaki did not know what had come over him, that he now lacked the motivation to even get up from the couch and at least switch on the light now that the room was slowly but surely darkening.

He didn't want to be alone.

When the phone rang, Misaki jumped. The noise echoed unnaturally, and Misaki couldn't seem to get his body to move, his heart was thumping so hard. After fifteen rings, it stopped. Misaki was only aware that he was breathing heavily, as if frightened by a _phone_ of all things, after the noise had ceased as abruptly as it had begun.

And then the phone rang again, and Misaki had calmed down enough by this time to stumble towards it, and pick it up with fumbling, shaking hands.

"… Hello?"

"Misaki! Misaki, why didn't you answer the phone when I rang the first time? How am I supposed to know you're okay when you won't even answer the phone?"

"I…"

Hearing Usagi's voice on the other end, more than slightly louder than necessary given Usagi's aggressive concern, made Misaki tremble.

He did the worst thing he could have possibly done, and dropped the phone.

Even several feet away, he could hear Usagi's voice quite clearly, now demanding, what was it, what was wrong?

"Misaki. Misaki!"

"I'm…" He tried again, foolishly still looking down at where the phone had fallen instead of picking it up to speak. He was just tired; Usagi was overreacting as usual, it was just like he was standing right next to Misaki, and he could see Usagi's eyes boring into him, seeing every weak spot, reaching out with his big stupid bear-hands that were nearly twice the size of Misaki's own-

"I'm fine!" said Misaki loudly, and the voice on the floor by his feet finally paused. Time enough for Misaki to look around, and find that the room was now nearly completely dark.

Something broke. It might have been the shadows surrounding him, or the growing coldness, or the fact that he could no longer hear Usagi's voice, or even his own shaky statement of denial.

Because: "Usagi-san", he said, and his voice broke along with whatever else just had. His hand moved automatically to cover his mouth, but it was too late, far too late.

"Don't move", Usagi ordered, and this command, coming from a man who was hours, days away, sounded funny enough that Misaki gave a hysterical snort of laughter that quickly turned into smothered sobs.

"Misaki!-" His hand slammed on the button that would disconnect the call with such force that the phone stand itself clattered to the floor to rest alongside the receiver, before Usagi could say another word.

Before he could hear anything else that would label Misaki as alone.

He didn't know how much longer he stood before crumpling to the floor himself, a choking, shameful mess. If Usagi tried to ring again in this time, Misaki wasn't aware – the phone remained switched on and away from the hook while Misaki struggled and failed to contain the awful loneliness.

The inescapable truth.

He _was_ alone.

"Usagi-san", he heard himself say, as if the name itself was some sort of protection from it.

It wasn't, and he was _cold_. His body curled in on itself, shuddering, as he closed his eyes against the darkness.

The receiver lay just beside his ear. After a time, eyes still firmly closed, he thought he heard Usagi's voice again. Which was impossible, given that nobody would be able to ring, but there was his name, and a kind of rhythmic thumping to accompany it, and then a loud slam that made him jerk in sleepy surprise, his arms and legs stiff and sore and freezing from being on the ground for so long in one frozen position, and his name again, much louder this time, too loud, he didn't need to yell over the phone, it wasn't as if he were deaf-

He opened his eyes again when the voice grew altogether too insistent, and cringed away from the brightness. Somebody had switched the light on.

"Usagi-san…"

He was gaping in shock, not even giving a token struggle as Usagi's arms enveloped him and he was pressed unceremoniously against a warm, broad chest. He could hear Usagi's heartbeat against his ear, even as Usagi's voice washed over him, _Misaki_, _Misaki_, over and over and over again.

"Usagi, san, what are you-"

The rest of the sentence, whatever it was going to have been, died and was forgotten as Usagi's mouth covered his. Dextrous fingers brushed away the few last droplets that tracked their way from Misaki's eyes, almost roughly.

"Just tell me." Usagi's voice was nearly harsh in its insistence.

Misaki blinked.

"Tell you…"

"Just tell me the next time you feel alone. Don't keep it all to yourself like it's nothing, like I don't have the right to know."

"I'm not- I wasn't-"

Usagi's lips crushed the lie.

They quashed the rest of Misaki's mostly incoherent babbling, too, as he was picked up, blankly refused the option of walking, carried like he weighed nothing at all up the stairs, practically thrown onto the bed. Even less choice than usual, if such a thing were possible, of complying or not to Usagi's very physical, very controlling demands.

There was no real alternative to not being alone.

(Misaki found that, all things considered, he didn't mind as much as he thought he should have.)


End file.
